


Dear you

by SweetSalt



Category: Figure Skating RPF
Genre: 2019/2020 season, Author had this sitting in her drive since February, Freeform, Gen, What even was
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-06
Updated: 2020-08-06
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:53:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25747702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SweetSalt/pseuds/SweetSalt
Summary: When you finish you collapse on your ending pose, gasping. You inhale gulp after gulp of air but nothing reaches your lungs. It feels like an asthma attack. It feels like dying. There is fire in your throat, your chest, your fingertips. Every part of you prickles from an aftershock as though you have just survived a bolt of lightning. You feel alive.Or: a meditation on 2019/2020 season.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 21





	Dear you

**Author's Note:**

> I started writing this pre-Worlds, pre-pandemic, pre-everything. It sat unfinished and I wasn't going to publish it, but I'm actually proud of some of the things here, so here you have it I guess.

i. Dear you (whose bones crave rest),

You are so tired, but you had never learned how to fall asleep. How can one sleep when there is much to do, much to live through, so many butterflies to chase and flowers to smell. How can one sleep when others await, when others are dead. So much. So many, to live for.

Someone had taken your internal clock, opened its glass cover, and flicked the arms with a thumb and forefinger. Your head spins. Your knees wobble. You slide down against a wall in a quiet hallway. A cameraman lightly, carefully, asks if you were alright. There is only ever one answer to that question. _Of course, I am alright. It’s just jetlag. I’m just stretched thin across three countries. It’s normal._

_I am alright._ You insist, throwing yourself into a triple axel you have no hope of landing. The technique is perfect as always; your ankle just refuses to hold on. You close your eyes upon impact, ears burning. They’re all watching, ah, judges and officials and coaches and senpai and kouhai and your fans. Your stars. When you finish you take your bows and — because they deserve it — look at them in the eyes. _I’m sorry, my stars. You all traveled so far and wide for me. It’s just my silly head, silly knees, they crave rest. And I…_

(You flee behind folds of curtains, lest the world sees your trembling lips or hear your weak words.)

(( _I’m so tired._ ))

ii. Dear you (whose heart crave courage),

Your legs are shaking. The howling wind of your music has started but your legs are shaking. For an insane second, you don’t know if you can stand up from your opening pose. You can taste fear like blood in your mouth.

God, you pray, lend me youth. Lend me foolishness. Anything that feels like bravery would do.

The fans call it the second grand prix curse. You wouldn’t call it a curse personally. Once is bad luck. Twice is carelessness. Thrice, now thrice is a curse. Always so fabled that number Three. 

You swallow three times and miraculously stand up. Blood in your mouth. Bile in your mouth. You stroke around the rink, gather speed, cross your legs, then snap your hip upward into four rotations. You land on a shaking leg, stepping out. You almost let out a cry in relief. Oh, a younger you would never let you hear the end of it. He would have been appalled at the thought of settling for a mistake. Younger you hadn’t yet had to relearn how to jump from a single loop.

When you finish you nod to yourself. No, you are not happy with that performance; it was riddled with mistakes and stiffness. Still, you allow yourself just one moment of weakness to feel awfully brave. 

iii. Dear you (whose lungs crave breath),

A quad loop goes by like a breeze, a quad lutz as light as air. Laughter comes bubbling when you pop the final triple axel, bordering on a high or a hysteria. Somehow it doesn’t feel like a mistake. How could it have been a mistake when you are having so much fun?

When you finish you collapse on your ending pose, gasping. You inhale gulp after gulp of air but nothing reaches your lungs. It feels like an asthma attack. It feels like dying. There is fire in your throat, your chest, your fingertips. Every part of you prickles from an aftershock as though you have just survived a bolt of lightning. You feel alive.

And you lose. There’s no pretending that it hasn’t stung like salt in a wound. But it also feels silly to deny yourself the truth that you had so much fun out there, flying ever so close to the sun. Your chest aches for days afterward. You can’t tell if it ached from how hard you had heaved after the free skate, or from the young, foolish longing for the wind above, up high in the sky, where the air tastes so sweet and pure.

_Ah, stars_ , you ponder. _I have worried you all again, haven’t I. I’m very sorry. Yet I will continue to worry you so, again and again. Please find it in your heart to forgive me._ There are simply so many butterflies to chase up there.

iv. Dear you (who are lost, are found),

There will be consequences, and criticisms, and questions, and far too much noise made about your decision to return to your roots. Even your coaches lift an incredulous brow at the very idea, but soon they come around, after you softly, smilingly, tell them,

“I’m so tired.”

And who wouldn’t be? Brian nods understandingly, for he too knows the weight of two Olympic cycles on a skater. Ghislain squishes you in an overly long hug. Tracy helps you call up Jeffrey to once more refine the step sequence. Once more, once again. You had wanted to leave Ballade no. 1 and Seimei forever bathed in Pyeongchang golden light, but now you find yourself lost in a deep night, and the only way out is to follow your North Star home.

Your body aches and cracks after a long flight to Korea. You had gotten some sleep on the plane though so you’re not too tired. You skate to a clean run-through of Ballade no. 1 at first practice to uproarious applause. You try out a new sequence of jumps confidently: quad sal, triple axel, triple flip. A spin to follow. You exit the spin and, without a thought, sharply draw your arms outward — choreographic transition to Seimei step sequence.

All at once, the arena erupts in excitement. _Seimei!_ They point and whisper feverishly to each other. _It’s Seimei!_

You don’t smirk, you don’t smirk, you don’t, oh, you smirk just a little.

The night illuminates. The stars around you all shine so brightly.

v. Dear you,

A Super Slam followed by an act of god; swift and terrible. It’s just you now, at home, you and your unsheath skates and music trembling through your marrow. The house is quiet on most days. There is no wind outside. The world has sucked in a collective breath, and held. 

You cradle the song in your chest, holding.

Breathe. Keep breathing. You are learning to live by the count of one, two, three, one again. One sunrise at a time. It’s hard, feels too much like when you tore a ligament — a house arrest. How ironic that finally you have managed one whole season injury-free. And there’s nothing freeing at the end. 

You wait, soul aching.

For butterflies. For sun flare licking the pad of your fingertips. Stars who shower you with light. You find yourself even missing turbulent flights and nights spent tossing and turning on stiff hotel mattresses. All the annoying, beautiful things you associate with competing.

But most of all, you just miss the ice. 

One, two, three, one, you yearn, you wait. One, two, one, two; drum beats in your bones.

Dear you, whose tired voice craves to sing aloud, we will wait for you. Breathe. Keeping breathing. There is no wind right now but there will be. Please know this with a sunrise certainty. You belong uphigh, so the wind will surely, eventually, take your waxless wings there, to a sky burning bright blue.

Dear you, it’s been a long year, and you have been so brave throughout it all.

Rest now. 

We’ll meet again.

**Author's Note:**

> Wear mask and stay safe y'all


End file.
